Such a Waste
by OscartheGreedy
Summary: Jade leaves Keterburg, Saphir tries to make him stay. Jade/Dist, maybe?


Ignoring the hair that bumps into my face with every step, I run, skinny legs outstretched. I've never been very athletic and even at a pace slower than this flat-out sprint, I'd be out of breath. The cobbles on the sidewalk are covered in early-spring slush. I slip, and a couple of brawny workmen types lugging boxes down onto a loading dock jeer good-naturedly. My face is red, I assume, and my good pants have a giant, tasteful wet spot right over the ass. I'm not really dressed for this, and my vision hasn't been great lately anyway. The buildings are a ghastly blur of navy and burnt sienna, the ocean a flat expanse of steely gray.

Jade, Jade, Jade, I mouth. You'd better be thankful for this.

What time is it?, I think desperately, as I reach a dead end and wheel around. There are only five ships at the docks, you idiot. You've passed them all. I feel like crumpling. The street is empty, the only movement I can register distant, or the halting downwards motion of snow. I crumple. Knees on the ground. Palms on the ground. Lorelei, it's cold. Forehead on the ground. Ow. That was idiotic. This whole enterprise is idiotic.

"You're idiotic."

My head jolts upwards.

"Jade?" I sputter. I can discern his shape, his color, in front of me. Where the hell did he come from?

Jade, my dearest friend, my partner in crime, takes a step towards me, kneels, and leans forward, through the veil of myopia I really need to take care of one of these days. Together we come to a stand.

"Can you see me?"

"I can!" I exclaim, a little too loudly. What does he _do_ to me? Around him, I am always too eager to please. To rescue my dignity, I automatically put on my officious face.

"Why didn't you let me know where you were? I practically _ran_ here, didn't even have time to dress warmly-"

"Good. I want you to be able to see me. I have a few minutes until my ship arrives, and I must admit, I have no idea how you heard that I was leaving. I presume Peony, in one of those spasms of goodwill that he's prone to, let you know."

Peony, that thief of attention and affection. Peony, the boy with more wealth, friendship, and privilege than I could ever have. It took me a year to discover he was not who he said he was... not the son of humble merchants, but a prince. The new knowledge did not make me respect him, but gave me more fuel for resentment. Yes, he did tell me that you were leaving, and his blue eyes showed something like love and pity.

"--no! I'm able to do things for myself, you know..."

"Of course. Don't let me be the one to disparage you."

I find myself at a loss for words, as I do so often in the face of Jade's seemingly senseless hurtfulness. How does he know everything?

His red eyes, hidden behind rectangular lenses, show mild annoyance. A hand flicks upwards and pushes a strand of dirty blonde hair away from his face. He smells faintly of soap. I fixate on a spot on his neck. My nose dribbles and lower lip purses as I will myself not to bawl right in front of him.

"Enough with the hysterics, Saphir-the-runny. You and I are old enough to speak openly."

"W--_you're_ the one who's acting like a child!" I choke, running an arm under the offending nose.

"Just packing up and leaving for another _continent_, without even a word to your closest friend! What will I do without you?! How will I ever get the professor back by myself?!"

He waits there, patiently.

"I--I try so _hard_ just to make everything work, and you don't appreciate my effort, my intelligence, anything. It's like...like you don't even want her _back_ with us anymore...I guess you never cared as much about her as I did, huh? You could never stand someone telling you that you were wrong..."

His foot taps absently against a suitcase. There are two of them, uniform white plastic with gold clasps.

"Well, I _do_! Unlike you and--and _Peony_, I can't just make friends that easily!

"Y--you'd have to have a _paper bag_ over your head not to see that I'm in love with you!"

Silence reigns. Snow continues to drift downwards in dizzying little circles, melting almost as soon as it hits the ground. My mouth hangs open a little and my palms flutter awkwardly before settling into my pockets.

Jade tilts his head downwards a little and straightens his glasses.

"Saphir, I'm going to be completely honest with you." Why won't he meet my eyes?

"It's not so much that I don't appreciate your intelligence, or your hard work, which I'm sure you esteem enough for the both of us.

"I just don't value any of the ends to which you put it. I find it..._abhorrent_ that you continue to work on a project which has caused nothing but harm to others. I find it _irritating_ that we did not both develop a sense of temperance at the same time. I sometimes wonder if you ever will. And I'm not even going to honor that crack about Professor Nebilim with a reply.

"You remind me of how I was ten years ago, when I was _nine_. And you're obsessed with me as I was then.

"Perhaps I wouldn't be as...as _irked_ by all of this if if...if it wasn't such a waste of a human being." His shoulders shake a little. Laughter? Grief?

"Your genius and your creativity are being squandered here. And no, I don't have a paper bag over my head, as you'd put it. Your absurd, codependent, misguided love is squandered on me, too. I'm going to be quite happy not having to worry about you anymore." He looks up, finally, mouth a little open with that wry Jade smile, ready to continue.

I taste, with horror, tears and snot that are trickling into my mouth. If only they had arrived earlier, he might have stopped talking, stopped wounding me, bent down to my height, wiped them away with the absent kind of affection I saw in him when we were small.

"You and I are very different people," I hear myself say, and I flee, leaving him there motionless...


End file.
